teenage engineering might quit synths, but parody can’t quit them

teenage engineering CEO Jesper Kouthoofd made waves when he casually mentioned he’d told the company he founded to quit making synthesizers. Whatever is coming from the Stockholm company, the jokes they inspire show no signs of abating and — this seems an opportunity.

Enjoy Monty Python’s Argument Sketch on two vintage speech synthesizers

A DECtalk Express stands in for Monty Python actor Michael Palin, with an Intex Talker (Votrax SC-01A) voicing the role of John Cleese. Retro speech synthesis just sounds better. Not more intelligible, necessarily, but absolutely better. And it’s hilarious. Eat your heart out, Transmediale / Ars Electronica / etc.: If all of this sounds familiar, […]

Peter Kirn - September 27, 2026

Throng, a 3D BlueSky interface, imagines social media as a mob

You’re just relaxing by a peaceful campfire. You hear voices in the distance. Then, like a really chatty zombie invasion… they come. And keep coming. It’s a 3D user interface for BlueSky, but it says something poetic — and hilarious — about the absurdity of social media.

Peter Kirn - September 5, 2026